First, DTS is a paperless system, so travel vouchers are now electronic. Paper receipts are scanned or faxed into DTS. This provides faster processing, and eliminates the chances of documents getting lost or sensitive travel materials being compromised. This also fills the requirement of maintaining travel claims for six years and three months in accordance with the National Archives Administration General Records Schedule.

Second, DTS features real-time reservations. No longer is there a need to spend time reaching a travel agent, or going back and forth due to requested transportation or lodging not being available. Assistance can be requested from the Commercial Travel Office in DTS via the ‘‘Request Assistance” button in the reservations module.

And third, there is a complete transaction history, including a record of every person who played a part in processing each travel document, indicating the date and time and what happened to it on each step of its way.

As with any new system, there are some differences in DTS that travelers will need to get used to. For example, funding validation and obligation occur after approval. This means that a travel order or voucher could be returned after it’s approved if the accounting information is determined to be incorrect.

Another difference in DTS is the system has travel rule pre-audit flags that require justification. Before DTS, human intervention was necessary to ensure enforcement of these rules.

For example, if a non-contract flight is selected in DTS, a justification is necessary for the travel rule pre-audit flag which is system generated. In the previous system, justification for non-contract flights was required but not system audited, thus requiring review by an individual.

Travel approvers need to take training on how DTS works, as well as a refresher on what they need to review on travel documents, and as a reminder of their responsibilities. Some approvers have been concerned about the references to ‘‘pecuniary liability” in the training, which simply means that approvers could be held financially liable if their negligence contributed to travel abuse. With responsible travelers and a sound review of travel orders and vouchers, such liability would be extremely rare.

While our Comptroller Department is working as hard as it can to get DTS running smoothly, there are many challenges. Comp-trollers had to completely re-build from scratch the massive routing tables that tell DTS what travel approvers can approve for which travelers, and they are continually working to improve the routing lists to make them more useful for the travelers. The comptroller folks are also very busy finishing the implementation of Navy ERP. On top of that, they are preparing for the changeover of the travel credit card contract later this year to assure a smooth transition from Bank of America to CITIBANK.

Initial DTS training has been geared toward travel preparers — admin personnel as well as travelers who prefer to prepare their own travel orders and vouchers. Arrangements are being made for more in-depth training for travel approvers for the April⁄May timeframe. In the meantime, DTS training for approvers can be found at this link: www.defensetravel.osd.mil⁄ppWBT⁄.

We encourage everyone — travelers, travel preparers, and travel approvers — to be as patient as possible as we transition through yet another change in our administrative environment. We have personally talked with many people involved with the implementation of DTS and have been thoroughly impressed by their dedication, hard work and tireless efforts to satisfy customer needs as quickly as possible. Calls to the travel help desk, while initially in the thousands, are now in the hundreds. Many questions are being answered and people are getting used to the new system. As with any change this big, there are growing pains and confusion at the beginning, but gradually over time, it settles down. When all the ‘‘dust settles”, we think all will agree that this ‘‘new era of government travel” is not only new, it is also better.

For additional information, visit the NAVAIR travel Web site at https:⁄⁄ travel.navair.navy.mil⁄travel_manager⁄index.html.